Carey Tang of Rooster & Owl Comes Home to Falls Church with New Restaurant Ellie Bird

The co-owner and managing director of the restaurants gets real about life behind the scenes. 

After hosting successful pop-ups, Carey Tang opened Rooster & Owl in 2019 and then sister restaurant Ellie Bird early this year. We caught up with Tang to talk running a business with a life partner, what she does with her rare time off and the restaurant scene in D.C. and outside of it.

District Fray: Running a business with a life partner is not for the faint of heart. How do you make it work?
Tang: Part of Rooster & Owl’s origin story is the years we spent on opposite schedules. Back in the day, [my husband] Yuan was in hospitality, so he was the night owl while I worked a desk job, a.k.a. the rooster. Now that we work together, it is definitely a balancing act to manage two teams and restaurants plus a growing family. There’s a lot of compromise and effort to navigate working so closely with your spouse, like setting boundaries and relearning how to communicate and support each other in both spheres. We mess up and are human, but we’re united in the same goals. We recognize the contributions and strengths of the other, knowing we understand that effort and the importance of it more than anyone else.

What do you do to get time for yourselves and disconnect from the restaurants?
Being able to step away on a day off and have intentional family time and personal time is so key. Although we’re not always successful, we try to encourage and enable that for one another. Our kids and our restaurants are very young, so we know we’re in a season not conducive to down time. When we are able to carve some time out, we love going out to eat together. 

What’s been the difference between the restaurant scene in D.C. and Falls Church?
We are Falls Church natives, and we both had our first jobs in hospitality in the area. There is something extremely nostalgic about “coming home” and opening a concept here in our hometown. Both communities are pretty diverse. We did intentionally make Ellie Bird a bit more family friendly, hoping that the same parents bringing their kids for brunch at Ellie Bird might treat themselves to a date night at Rooster & Owl in the city.

Ellie Bird recently rolled out weekend brunches. There’s something happening every night at Rooster & Owl and the menu rotates seasonally. To learn more, visit roosterowl.com and elliebirdva.com. Follow on Instagram @roosterandowl + @elliebirdva.

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Abi Newhouse